


A Lifetime

by cryogenia



Series: The Many Lives of Alfons Heiderich [1]
Category: Fullmetal Alchemist (Anime 2003)
Genre: M/M, love loss and everything after
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-28
Updated: 2016-10-28
Packaged: 2018-08-27 11:34:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 852
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8400097
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cryogenia/pseuds/cryogenia
Summary: The roll of the waves comes in and out like a heartbeat, and Edward kills the motor where he remembers they should.
Alphonse has never seen the sea.





	

**Author's Note:**

> [Originally posted 2/1/07]
> 
> This was one of the most personal things I have ever written. And I still don't know if the words really came out right, or if this says exactly what I feel about it. But I tried. And I'm proud of it.

_I don't know why we have to turn off here,_ his brother speaks with his old words, almost exactly; word for word, tone for tone. Not everything takes him back like this, but that does, and this place does, and he eases the car off toward the sand on the horizon with single-minded determination.  
  
 _I know,_ he says, which is what, in turn, had been said to him. _I just thought you should see it._  
  
Nineteen-hundred and twenty-something; older than he was the first time he came here, in many, many ways, but there are some things he thinks that will always make him feel young. They crest the next hill and his brother’s dubious air turns in to one of wonder.  
  
The roll of the waves comes in and out like a heartbeat, and Edward kills the motor where he remembers they should.  
  
Alphonse has never seen the sea.  
  
 _No, it is not a lake, Alfons laughs at him, leaning up against the hood, gingerly. Still hot from the drive.  
  
It is nothing like a lake at all. It is the ocean, haven’t you seen it? It is like-_  
  
 _-water here unto forever,_ he remembers he was thinking that very first time they’d escaped up here, and his brother’s expression now suggests the same.  
  
There is a moment of hesitation, and then, gloriously: his brother, twenty-four, kicks off his shoes in the waves like he was seven. Treaded tracks, then barefoot feet, both obliterated in the next wave. He follows along after, watches his own prints fill in and be eaten, only to press in again when the water pulls out and takes the sands beneath him with it.  
  
The past and present overlap here at once and are swallowed, until dying is the same as not yet being born.   
  
_And Alfons is lying back now, unbuttoning his shirt; he wonders why he does that, it is not that hot or that humid. Lays back, and his shirt ripples like the ocean does, two things both caught in the wind. And no one is out here, it is just the two of them, and Alfons reaches up to bridge the gap the way he can’t.  
  
No one is allowed to be so proud, he whispers, drawing him down; you never reach out when you're giving up._  
  
A stray shell amuses and Alphonse stoops to reach for it, is surprised when the next wave steals it away first. It is not like the river, which has its fits but generally behaves; the ocean is its own creature and draws you in, spits you out.  
  
His brother turns to him, eyes shining. “How did you know how to find this place?” he asks and Edward could make snide comments _(this world is mostly water, here unto forever, and ever and ever amen)_ but he answers sincerely.   
  
"I have been here before," he says truthfully. “You getting engaged reminded me of it. I just thought you should see-”  
  
 _Contrast through similarity, Alfons's library-pale against the white sands outside, radiating car hood against cooler body heat, and a million other things that will not come twice again: the feel of buttons, chest hair, skin. He loses his virginity in stages, in sudden fits and starts, and Alfons just offers himself up  
  
Offers himself up_  
  
It is not like a pond, it is not like a lake, it is bigger than any of them, and salt stings at his cheeks and not all of it is from the air.  
  
 _No words no time no sound no mind, three minutes of slide, give and take, like the rippling of water, like the crest and fall of waves, and it breaks over him like the ocean at their back until Alfons reaches up to ground him._  
  
 _Three and a half minutes that will never come again; but three and half minutes in which he will always_ be.  
  
“Brother?” Alphonse asks at the mist in his eyes, and he knows he can’t ask what he wants to. Can’t ask him to stay because he _does_ love his brother, because sometimes love is just about offering yourself up. And it will be the hardest thing he will ever have to do next month, giving his little brother away at a wedding, but he will never be gone exactly, because now the two of them will always share the sea.  
  
 _I just wanted you to see,_ he says, though his voice is not his own anymore. It is Alfons’s and it is the ocean, and he hears the gulls crying over waves that spread here unto forever, and he knows again that though the water steals away things, out there somewhere, love will always be.  
  
 _I understand what you were telling me._  
  
And Alphonse nods. He seems to understand.  
  
"Thank you for giving me this," his brother smiles sweetly, and Edward merely dips his head. They go back to the car now, and sit, and drive, because that is all there is left to say.   
  
A hundred miles later he shuts his eyes, and swears he can still hear the sea.


End file.
